An amusement arcade (game center) provides arcade game machines or apparatuses (hereinafter simply referred to as a game machine), which can print and output user's original stickers by photographing a self-portrait of the user with a built-in camera and framing the portrait with a desired modifiable frame. Each of these game machines comprises dedicated hardware.
In order to attract a user during non-operating period of a game machine, game machines of this type display various animation (moving images) on the display screen for a demonstration.
For instance, in a case of a shooting game, the game machine may display a sample of the shooting game for the demonstration. Therefore, special hardware does not need to be added to such game machines.
However, in a case of a game machine which mainly prints stickers, an additional function, which is different from printing stickers, is necessary to display such demonstration. This causes an increase in cost of the game machine. For instance, in order to display animation, images must be stored frame by frame. Thus, in order to store an extremely large amount of data, a large memory capacity is required. Furthermore, generating such animation requires extremely time consuming operation.
Moreover, although a conventional game machine of this type has a simple construction for photographing an image with a built-in camera, synthesizing the photographed image with an appropriate frame, and printing the image, the game machine comprises dedicated hardware. Therefore, manufacturing the game machine requires a high cost.
Furthermore, because of the simplicity of the operation, the game machine is unable to print varieties of stickers desired by users. For instance, a user cannot input or select arbitrary character strings, e.g., user's name or the like, to be combined together and printed.
In a case where a user can select or input various character strings, the operation of the game machine tends to become complicated. Furthermore, in such case, the game machine must be designed so that a user can easily change contents of the inputted setting after or in the middle of input operation.